Sherwood Shorts
by traveller19
Summary: A place for drabbles  100 words apiece  for BBC's Robin Hood.
1. Someday, Eastward

Someday, Eastward

"_What_ are you doing?" Guy stood with his arms crossed over his chest, one eyebrow raised.

"I'm givin' Haytham his breakfast." Allan smiled affectionately as he ran a finger over the bird's smooth head.

"You brought a _pigeon_ all the way back from the Holy Land?" Gisborne's voice held a slightly mocking tone. "And you _named_ it?"

"Haytham's not an _it_, he's a _him_." Allan cradled the cooing bird in cupped hands. "We're in the same boat, me and him. We've got people waitin' for us."

Guy saw that Allan's were wet as he looked Eastward toward the rising sun.


	2. A Carpenter's Hands

A Carpenter's Hands

Dan Scarlett paced anxiously across the yard. Matilda had been in the house for eternity, it seemed, but he knew that if he tried to go and check on Jane, he would just be shooed out again.

Finally the door opened and the midwife beckoned to him. Dan rushed to his wife's side, her smile confirming what they had both hoped for: a boy.

"Hello, William!" He peered proudly at the face of his newborn son, only to jump backward as the infant reached up and firmly grabbed ahold of Dan's nose with surprising strength.

"He's got a carpenter's hands!"


	3. Covert Operation

**Covert Operation**

"Can you reach them?"

"Just a little bit higher, Djaq."

"If I straighten up any more, you will fall off of my back! Can't you just stretch your arms out farther?"

"My arms are not long enough!"

"Well at least _you_ haven't got someone standing on top of your back!"

"You would crush me!"

"Just _try_!"

"All right... I can feel it with my fingertips..."

_Crash._

"Djaq?"

"Safi...that was the cookie jar, wasn't it?"

"Yes. And that is mother and father rushing down the hall with candles."

"Djaq! Safiyya!"

"Children, what are you doing?"

The twins had been caught.


	4. The One I Love Part I

**The One I Love Part I**

Given its scorching heat in the day, the desert was oddly cold at night. As he shivered, Robin's thoughts drifted across the boundaries of sea and time, imagining the softness of her hands, her breath on his ear, the tickle of her lips barely brushing his skin. Her body was next to his, banishing the chill from his bones and heart. For a moment, the screams of dying men, the acrid tang of blood, the sick fear of the enemy charge, all vanished as Marian whispered his name. The horrors of war would remain, but for tonight, it was enough.


	5. The One I Love Part II

**The One I Love Part II**

Hoofbeats padded through Knighton, just as they did every day, several times a day. The horse could bear any number of people through the village. Most often it was a merchant or peasant, transporting wares to Nottingham Town or one of the other hamlets in the county. Sometimes it was a traveller, just passing through, planning to stop in town for the night for a rest, an ale, and maybe a woman.

For three years, Marian had looked out her window at every sound of hoofbeats, the same prayer silently passing her lips each time.

"Let it be my Robin."


	6. Needs

**Needs**

Djaq stared into the dying flames, stroking Allan's hair though the action was no longer necessary. Her friend's grief had finally driven him into sleep; her own was what kept her awake. Djaq's father had told her once that twins were closer than other siblings, and she believed it. The face she had known since childhood floated before her eyes, and she swallowed back tears.

She did not feel Will's presence until he was beside her. He slipped a hand around her thin shoulders, and she found herself leaning into him. He sensed her needs. It was her turn now.


	7. Whispers

**Whispers**

If the pitching and rolling of the ship made Allan sick in his stomach, so much more so did the suspicious and accusatory glances cast his way by the people he had once called his friends. The whispers and glares made obvious the fact that his presence was not welcome. He could tell them a hundred million times how sorry he was-it would make no difference.

But then he felt a small, smooth hand in his, and a thumb running comfortingly across his forehead and down the side of his face. He trembled as she murmured,

"I forgive you."


	8. Not Hard At All

**Not Hard At All**

_I've gotten very good at being silent_, thought Marian proudly as she crept away from her listening post near the door of the Sheriff's office. _Very good inde-_

"Listenin' in on the Sheriff's meetin', were you?" Marian whirled to see Allan leaning against the stone wall, arms folded over his chest, a cocky smile on his lips.

"I... I was just..." _How does he always seem to know these things_?

He grinned mischievously. "How about a deal? A kiss for my silence. Not hard, right?"

Marian wasted no time in planting her lips firmly upon his.

"Not hard at all."


	9. Father

When he got home from Scarborough, having seen Luke settled back in, Will sat on the hillside back in Sherwood and stared at the rock face where he had carved the monument to his father, willing the sun to ignite it again, even though he knew the time for it had passed and he would not see the face again until the morrow.

Hearing heavy footsteps behind him, he turned to see Little John lower himself to the ground. The big man put a hand on his shoulder, and Will felt the hole in his heart - "father" - begin to close.


	10. All I Have

The floor's hard and cold in the dungeon, and as I lay here I've got nothing to do but think. I shouldn't have done it, I see that now. I should have known this plan would swing back and hit me-it would be just my luck. But you've always been there to get me out of trouble, and I've never repaid you for that. I was happy to see you, almost-broken nose and all, because I could finally show you what I've become.

Please come and save me. I'll be better, you'll see.

You're all I have left.


	11. Forgotten

It seems odd to watch you sitting there at the campfire with the others, laughing and talking like you haven't got a care in the world. Not that I'm complaining; of course not. But the firelight in your eyes makes me remember the nights I sat with you, cooling your fever and calming your dreams. You would whimper into my shoulder, and I would tell you someday it would be all right. I was all you had then.

But now we've reached someday, sort of, and sometimes I think you've forgotten me. But it's all right; I'll always be here.


	12. Not Funny

"This really isn't funny, Much."

"You are dangling wrong-side-up from a tree by one leg, caught in a trap that you made, placed, and set yourself. Tell me how this isn't funny!"

"It isn't funny because my leg's falling asleep and the blood's all rushing to my head!"

"You know what? I think it's because you don't want anyone else to see you up there."

"You mean like me?"

"Allan!"

"That, mate, is the funniest thing I've seen in a long time."

"Come on, cut me down."

"Should we, Allan?"

"No, Much, I've got a better idea...Dja-aq!"


End file.
